Why Does My Husband Ignore Me?

This one has a huge gender difference root. Men can sit together for hours saying nothing and neither feels ignored. Women generally don’t function this way. His threshold for “ignoring” is probably different from yours.

If you’ve been married awhile it’s certainly possible he has started to take you for granted. This results in ignoring. Perhaps he’s become too busy with other things, thus giving you less attention than he should.

Another factor can be boredom. Your relationship has become predictable, or minimal, or both. You no longer catch his attention much, so he gives you little attention. I’ve talked in the past about men’s need for adventure, and their desire toshare adventure with their wife. Men are big on action, so good relationships are built around doing things, especially exciting and challenging things. This is where we put our time and energy.

Ignoring you can also be a sign he’s unhappy with his life in general. It’s not you, he’s withdrawing in general. He puts himself into sports, video games, or whatever as a way of escaping his reality.

He might also be ignoring you because he doesn’t know how to relate to you, or feels he “loses” when he interacts with you. Ignoring is a means of self-defence.

Finally, he may be ignoring you because he feels you’re ignoring him. Or, you’re ignoring something he finds important. (Yes, sex is a common example.) If you don’t make what he cares about a priority, why would he make you a priority?

Much of what I’ve said here is passive-aggressive behaviour; deal with something you dislike by ignoring it. I’m certainly not suggesting this is a good way to deal with things, but it’s all too common for men. Often we do this because we don’t know how to talk about it, or we think talking about it will result in a fight. Ignoring it thus seems like the least bad of several bad choices.